Question about my brush setup snagging on a liner

Tried doing a full clean on a 6-inch clay flue last Tuesday and my poly brush kept catching on something halfway down. Took me like 20 minutes to wrestle it past that spot. Has anyone dealt with a rough seam or offset that causes this kind of hang-up?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_tara18d ago

Oh man, I feel your pain so hard on this one. Totally different situation but same energy - I was helping my cousin clean out his dad's old workshop chimney last spring and that brush got hung up on what we thought was a dead bird or something. Turned out there was this little metal tag from like 1950s ductwork just sticking out of the mortar joint, some old installer must have left it there. We spent a solid 45 minutes trying to figure out what was grabbing it, finally just took a coat hanger and bent it into a hook to pull the tag loose. Anyway, your thing sounds way more annoying cause at least ours was an easy fix once we found it. Hope you get that spot sorted without too much cussing.

knight.diana1mo ago

Found myself in almost the exact same spot last month with a 7-inch clay liner. Took me a good half hour just to get past this one section, swore I was gonna have to leave the brush down there and start a new career lol. Check if there's a misaligned tile or a glob of old mortar sticking out, those clay liners are never perfectly smooth. My brush kept hanging on what turned out to be a rough joint, had to hit it with a rotary tool on a flex shaft to smooth it out a bit.

white.alex1mo ago

You ever have one of those days where the universe just decides you're not moving that brush? My buddy Dave hit the same kind of wall with his 6-inch liner last fall. He spent almost an hour fighting a spot near the top where the tiles had shifted just a tiny bit over the years. Turned out a chunk of old creosote had hardened like concrete right at the seam. He finally gave up and chipped it out with a hammer and a flathead screwdriver, said he was about two seconds from just running a shop vac up there and calling it good enough.